Third Front on its mind, TRS pins hopes on good performance by regional parties in Lok Sabha elections

The Telangana Rashtra Samithi Monday said most of the regional parties are confident of turning in a good performance in the Lok Sabha elections, giving a boost to its chief K Chandrasekhar Rao's idea of forging a non-Congress, non-BJP federal front post-poll.

TRS banks on good show by regional parties in LS poll

The Telangana Rashtra Samithi Monday said most of the regional parties are confident of turning in a good performance in the Lok Sabha elections, giving a boost to its chief K Chandrasekhar Rao’s idea of forging a non-Congress, non-BJP federal front post-poll. TRS spokesperson Abid Rasool Khan said most of the regional parties were confident of getting lot of seats, and claimed they were open to the idea of such a front proposed by the Telangana Chief Minister. “As soon as the (Lok Sabha election) results are out, there would be parleys and formation of a (federal) front. If it has the majority, it will form the government,” Khan told PTI.

If this proposed front falls short of numbers, it will decide what role it should play and “how it will have control over the government so that the states don’t suffer and policies of the states are not affected,” he said. TRS is counting on parties such as the SP, BSP, BJD and YSRCP to be on board the proposed federal front, party leaders have said earlier. Khan said his party was ready to support the YSRCP in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, where Assembly and Lok Sabha elections would be held simultaneously on April 11, so long as it has no truck with the BJP or Congress.

In what way the TRS, the ruling party in Telangana, would back YSRCP in Andhra Pradesh is a matter of “political strategisation” between the leadership of the two outfits, he added. Khan said the AIMIM President and Hyderabad MP, Asaduddin Owaisi would campaign for TRS candidates in “all the districts, wherever we require his support, wherever there is sizeable population of minorities and Dalits, and we will extend our support to him in Hyderabad.”

TRS deputy floor leader in the Lok Sabha and Karimnagar MP, B Vinod Kumar, claimed Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who is also the TDP chief, was facing “lot of anti-incumbency” and it might help the YSRCP. Kumar said Chandrasekhar Rao would kick off the party’s campaign in Telangana with a public meeting in Karimnagar in March third week. The TRS, which won 11 of the total 17 seats in the previous Lok Sabha elections in 2014, was already in campaign mode with the party last week initiating Parliamentary constituency-wise meetings chaired by its working president K T Rama Rao. The TRS has said it aims to win 16 seats in the April 11 Lok Sabha polls in Telangana, leaving the Hyderabad segment to Owaisi who would be backed by the party.